


Two Stolen

by spidersrorg



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Childhood Friends, F/F, Growing Up Together, M/M, Multi, Nonbinary Character, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-25
Updated: 2018-05-27
Packaged: 2019-01-05 12:33:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12190086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spidersrorg/pseuds/spidersrorg
Summary: When the child of the Hoshidan queen is kidnapped, a child of Nohr is taken as ransom.In which Leo is stolen rather than Azura.(Note: this fic has been dropped, but more or less is contained.)





	1. Azura, 11; Leo, 7

“Wait!”

 

Azura stopped, the stone floor of the halls cold on her bare feet. It was rare for her to be called after, even rarer in such a cheery tone. Usually any word spoken to her was a reprimand.

 

Nohr was cold. She longed for the home of her mother.

 

“Who are you?” the voice asked again. So cheerful.

 

A child her age, one she had never seen in the castle, nor in her new home of the Northern Fortress. A face beaming bright with wide red eyes and cold white-blonde hair trailing over shoulders.

 

“...Azura.”

 

“Wow! Are you my sister, too?”

 

Azura furrowed her brows, “Are you a child of King Garon?” He had many, it was known, even siring them while he had been married to her mother. Luckily, none had ever been born of him to her mother.

 

“Yes! I’ve just been brought here. I was with a healer before I moved here. Father even visited me while I was there.”

 

“I am not your sister in any way that matters,” Azura smiled sadly. This child was friendly, and she longed for a friend here.

 

“...Oh. Do you live here? Father doesn’t want me in the castle because of my health…”

 

It was rare that the King chose favorite children. That he would oversee one’s health, care to them? This must be a far-favored child. One of a beautiful mistress? A secret wife?

 

Azura, the abandoned stepchild, was the least loved of all.

 

“...I do,” Azura said, “Likely you don’t want to speak to me, though. You’ll be scolded.”

 

“Huh? Why?”

 

“The other royal children aren’t allowed to talk to me.”

 

“That’s weird,” the child pulled a face, “but can we be friends?”

 

Azura couldn’t help that a smile tugged at her lips. A friend… that would be nice. She never had one besides her mother.

 

“That would be nice, uhm…,”

 

“Corrin!”

 

“Corrin.”

 

Maybe, today, Nohr had some warmth.

* * *

* * *

* * *

  


Leo had realized, hours ago, that yelling had been futile. There was something in his mouth, a bag over his head. He knew was likely out of the city long before he had awoken, so there would be no one around to hear.

 

All he could tell of his surroundings was cold air, hay tickling his skin, and the bumps in the road. He was in a farmer’s carriage, he gathered that, and by the speed, led by horses rather than oxen. There were two captors, by the sound of someone rustling in the hay nearby him and the knowledge that there had to be a driver.

 

The second prince of Nohr was smart, but for all the intelligence he had for his age, he was of but seven years and had no strength against grown men.

 

“Old man,” the voice was the one in the hay with him, the voice of a boy. He supposed it wasn’t two grown men after all? The voice continued: “are we almost there?”

 

A snort came from the front of the cart, the driver. “We have days, kid.” That one was a man.

 

More knowledge of his situation. But what could he do with it?

 

“I gotta piss,” the boy whined.

 

“...Fine,” the man sighed, and the cart began to slow, “take him, too.”

 

“Ew, I’m not holding it for him.”

 

That was met with some laughter from the man-- a husky, throaty sound. “We’re far enough. Untie his hands.”

 

Even so young, Leo had royal combat training. Maybe if he had a chance, he could get to the horses, get away. Especially with untied hands?

 

But then he felt the boy pulling him out of the cart, cutting the bonds around his wrist with a knife. He was stronger than Leo. And had a weapon. Leo had forgot about weapons.

 

The first thing he did with access of his hands was rip the bag off of his head.

 

It was true what the man had said, they were too far away from anything for him to run. He was smart enough to know that. Empty plains of Nohr’s dead soil surrounded him, lit by the dim purple light of sunrise.

 

His arm was grabbed and sharply tugged. He turned his head from the landscape to meet the eyes...eye… of one of his captors, the boy. White hair, a strip of cloth wrapped around his face, skin that made Leo’s look pale as if he were a corpse. A boy just barely older than him.

 

“Come on,” the boy said, “the old man doesn’t like to stop.”

 

Leo took the cloth from his mouth and spit on the ground, “You know who I am, don’t you? You’ll be punished--”

 

And the one from the cart turned grim, a man with greying hair and hunched shoulders, “Of course we know who you are. Sorry about this and all, but a contract’s a contract.”

  


\--

  


The ride went through countless miles of empty plains, soil cracked and dry with no hope of farming. This was Nohr, this was his country.

 

The ride was boring through all of that. The man and the boy would alternate driving, the man doing nothing but snoring when he joined Leo amongst the hay bales, the boy whittling away at a piece of wood.

 

_”A bow in case you run off,” he said when Leo had stared at him for a little too long._

 

“How much farther?” it was a question the other boy seemed to ask constantly. Leo was the one captive and he hadn’t even asked it once!

 

“Niles, shut up.”

 

“It’s Zero!” the boy, Niles, spat back.

 

The man in the front grunted.

 

Niles, a name. Leo had that.

“So, Niles…” Leo started, and he received a sharp glare in return.

 

Niles looked right past him and shouted at the driver, “See, _Shura_ , now he’s gonna try to talk to me and make friends and shit!”

 

The man laughed, “Make friends, it’ll be good for you.”

 

Leo pulled his knees to his chest and leaned into a pile of hay, burrowing into it as if that would hide him. He didn’t like the way these people talked about him.  But it was better than the way his siblings’ mothers would speak of him, spitting at him and asking when _he_ would drop off like some of his other siblings had…

 

He was scared here, but maybe it wasn’t as scary as home. These people hadn’t tried to hurt him yet after all.

 

“...I don’t want to make friends,” Leo said in a voice that wasn’t as strong as he was hoping it would, “I want to know where you’re taking me.”

 

“To our contractor, duh,” Niles replied.

 

“And who’s that?”

 

“I ain’t a snitch.”

 

Leo squinted at him, the vernacular lost on him.

 

The man in the front spoke, “He doesn’t know. He doesn’t get the intel he doesn’t have to.”

 

“Oh,” Leo responded, “Will you tell me, then?”

 

“Sorry, kid.”  


Leo snuggled into the hay, trying to find some comfort in its warmth, despite how it itched under his nightgown.

 

As the sun set, the plains around them seemed to begin sprouting life.

 

\--

 

Niles seemed just as awestruck as Leo  when the road changed.

 

There were trees full of leaves, bushes of flowers, green moss. Color covered the entire road around them. The soil was soft and a beautiful deep brown, rich and perfect for life to thrive. Leo had never seen such life except within the castle’s gardens, but here there was not even a single dragon vein used to keep the plants alive. It wasn’t needed.

 

These were the things Leo read about in his gardening books, the sort of place that his plants were supposed to grow. He peered over the side of the cart, watching everything go by. He started to name the plants he recognized, first in his head, then starting to mumble once he was stumped.

 

Then Niles moved to the other side of the cart, to sit beside Leo.

 

He pointed a finger out of the cart, “So what’s that one? The reddish one.”

 

“Camellias,” Leo replied. Hard to grow in his garden. Even with his magic, they’d wilted away.

 

“Huh,” was all Niles responded with, then he crossed his arms over the side of the wagon, and leaned onto them, “and that one?”

 

“Don’t touch that, you’ll get a rash,” Leo responded quickly. It didn’t even occur to him that maybe his captor, well, deserved a rash. For kidnapping him and all.

 

“Yikes.”

 

“You know what those camellias mean, boys?” came the voice of Shura.

 

Leo wracked his brain for the answer. He passed over the ‘language of flowers’ sections of his books, only interested in the growing part. Not the schmoopy romance stuff.

 

“...No. I don’t,” Leo said, a little dejected. Who knew that kidnapping meant he’d be quizzed.

 

  
“Does it mean we can eat them?” Niles then said, “I’m sick of hardtack.”

 

“Ew, Niles,” Leo squinched his nose.

 

Shura hummed, “I suppose you could eat it. Maybe.”

 

Leo cringed more.“So, what do they mean? You weren’t going to tell us about their edibility before.”

 

“Oh,” Shura then laughed, “It means we’re close.”

 

“ _Thank fuck_ ,” Niles huffed.


	2. Niles, 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Niles has a rough time.

The exchange had gone smoothly. 

 

Niles hadn’t been allowed in the room. Shura had cited his  _ bad mouth _ and  _ bad manners  _ as the reasons why. As if the old man was a portrait of purity himself! 

 

So once Shura took Leo into a room through the back entrance of Castle Shirasagi… that was the last Niles saw of him. In place of Leo, Shura had returned with a hefty sack of gold. Likely more than even some rich men’s coffers held.

 

Niles would be made for life.

 

When Niles woke up days later, Shura wasn’t in their room of the inn. He’d probably gone out to get breakfast or something. 

 

So he got up off the pathetic little mat they had been given to sleep on and polished his bow until his stomach finally grumbled. They were rich now after this job, they could afford breakfast. He didn’t need to go out and snag it. Why the fuck was Shura taking so long? 

 

He pulled aside the paper screen that separated his room from the rest of the inn, which apparently was on the cheaper end despite its proximity to the castle since they were given only mats to sleep on the floor and had PAPER for walls.

 

The innkeeper looked at him with a smile, for some weird reason, like he wasn’t unhappy to have a Nohrian under his roof, and spoke in clear Nohrian: “Ah, are you done with the room?”

 

“Uh, I guess?” Niles furrowed his brows.

 

“Your father took your cart out and horses before you woke.”

 

Niles’ eye grew wide, “ _ MOTHERFUCKER _ !”

 

“...I suppose he is a, ah, ‘motherfucker’, if that is what you call your fathers where you are from,” the innkeeper then mumbled something in his native language under his breath.

 

On any usual occasion, Niles would have pissed himself laughing at that, but right now there was a much more pressing matter at hand.

 

He ran out of the inn and into the street, then out down the main streets of Shirasagi, shoving aside anyone in his way. Which it seemed was not something usual in Hoshido, because he was yelled at quite a few times. In Nohr everyone was used to rude assholes like him. But he ignored them. Hoshidans needed to grow a fucking backbone.

 

Once he reached the city gates, he realized Shura was long gone. He didn’t know how long he’d been asleep after Shura left. The bastard had dipped and taken his lot of the money.

 

Niles had forgotten the most important part of being Nohrian underscum. Never trust  _ anyone _ .

 

\--

 

Hoshidans were so fucking bloated that Niles didn’t even  _ need _ to steal.

 

They threw out half of their damned food. All he had to do was make a quick run around the market after the shops closed and he had a meal. He even had  _ choices _ what he got to eat. Not just half-moldy bread that would break your teeth.

 

He didn’t even have to hide in the sewers like in Nohr, either. Food stalls were just left on their own overnight. Completely foolish, but he could just climb right into them. Bam, shelter.

With his stomach full, and a variety of places to duck during the night, he didn’t have his basic needs to worry about. Instead, he had other worries plaguing him.

He was trapped in  _ Hoshido. _

 

The language spoken was strange to his ears and the writing wasn’t consistent anywhere. He could hardly even read Nohrian to begin with. And here...he had no connections. In Windmire, he knew everyone, who to watch out for, who could patch you up after a fight. He had Shura.

 

That backstabbing bastard.

 

Shura had known a weirdly large amount about Hoshidan crime, though. But with what he’d told Niles? Niles couldn’t get involved at all. Men coated in tattoos beneath their clothes, strictly loyal to Hoshido. They’d never let in a Nohrian.

 

It was probably a matter of time before his dumpster diving would be noticed and he’d get in trouble with them. But he had no idea how to even tell.

 

\--

 

It wasn’t the crime groups that found him. 

 

Better or worse, it was the city patrol. Someone had seen him, snitched. Or they had just been lucky.

 

They’d seized him just as he was scrambling out of the stall, vaulting over the side. One had grabbed him, held him in a headlock. The other had a fine rope and wrapped it around his whole damned body, from down his neck, over his arms, down to his hips. He half-expected to be hog-tied. It was fairly quick for the intricate way it was done. 

 

Why they couldn’t just use manacles was beyond him. Oh, wait. What Nohr lacked in food, they made up for in iron. And where did Hoshido get its iron? Ha.

 

At least from what Shura told him, in an attempt to scare him, Hoshidan punishments were puny. In Nohr, torture was practically a form of art. Here, as a kid, he’d probably get a slap on the hand. 

 

Then the city guards started walking him by a leash. One guiding him, one holding the rope. What the fuck. Was he a dog.   
  
The streets were fairly empty as it was the middle of the night, but lanterns burned along the main street of Shirasagi. Did Hoshidans have that much oil to spare? Careless. The guards brought him down that road, speaking their language between each other and occasionally in scolding tones at him. He just cursed at them in his native tongue. Certainly they knew what that meant.

 

They were going in the direction of the castle, Niles could tell that much. Dungeons, probably? But then they made a turn, going into the vegetation surrounding the castle. He was worried now. At least, was worried until he saw some narrow wooden buildings.  Cells. Okay.

 

Then, he jolted. Because on the wind, he heard,

 

“Niles?”

 

He turned, but saw nothing.

 

Then, he heard the voice again, all but screaming in Hoshidan.

 

The guards stopped this time.

 

Out of the trees, Leo came running, panting for breath, “Stop. Stop. He’s with me.”

 

The guards suddenly seemed to lose interest in Niles, turning to Leo instead.

 

Apparently, they’d been feigning not understanding Niles, because one opened his mouth to Leo and spoke in an accusatory tone, “What are you doing out here?”

 

“...Prince Takumi told me this was the way to the outhouses.”

 

The guards looked between each other and one stifled a laugh.

 

“These are the cells,” he said, “he was playing a joke on you.”

 

Leo furrowed his brows, muttered under his breath.

 

“Hey, me,” Niles then piped up, “I’m with him. Lemme go.”

 

The guards both laughed at that, but… at least turned their direction and tugged him back toward the castle. Leo followed, walking beside him.

 

“Where’s Shura?” he asked.

 

“Fuck Shura. I’m gonna piss on his grave once he kicks it.”

 

Leo cringed at his language, “What--”

 

“No talking,” one of the guards spat, “none of your Nohrian secrets.”

 

Leo closed his mouth. Niles kept his shut, too. He had a leg-up now; he wasn’t going to get himself thrown in the prisons for pissing off the guards.

 

As they approached the castle, a figure stood on the wooden walkways surrounding the walls, seemingly waiting for them. The guards hadn’t made any signals. Who would know they were approaching, much less from a back entrance of the castle?

 

Niles turned toward Leo, but he seemed just as confused. There was something else there in his expression...recognition? Growing closer, Niles recognized, too, from the few fleeting glances he’d had.

 

“I’ve been expecting you!” Mikoto, Queen of Hoshido, cheered with a clap of her hands.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for how long it took me to update this :U i just got a job and while a lot of the later fic is done..................this scene just didn't want to leave my fingers
> 
> I have a couple of commissions to work on atm so we'll see if i get anymore done soon??? let's try for.... two weeks


	3. Azura, 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> note: this fic is being dropped, but i will be posting the remainder of what is written. 3 chapters at once

The royal family began visiting the Northern Fortress exceedingly often.

 

It was strange for Azura to see. The Crown Prince and the first princess and little toddler of a second princess, all there, all often. To visit little Corrin, who, apparently, they had never met before. Before, she would hear them bemoan the trip as a chore. 

 

Especially the little blonde boy. Who seemed to be gone.

 

…Dead, likely. A common fate for the King’s children. The King didn’t seem to care about that.

 

Which made Corrin’s case even odder. That the King cared about a sickly little thing. Sequestered them off away from the rest of the family to heal.

 

* _ ”I had the Rose Fever,” Corrin had said, “it reached my head and I lost my memories.” _

 

As much as Azura tried to pass things off… Corrin’s story was too strange. Too convenient? But Azura knew that if she dug too far, she knew she would be in trouble. Nohr had too many secrets. Her mother had warned her that nothing here was as it seemed.

 

And Corrin gave off an air, one that wasn’t their personality of sunshine, but one that had the spirit of clouds and fresh water air…

 

...Likely her imagination.

 

“Azura!”

 

She stopped walking her mindless path about the castle, to look out the window she had passed. Down below, outside on a battlement, Corrin stood with the Crown Prince, both with wooden swords in hand. Corrin waved up at her, bright smile on their face. They acted as if the castle were their playground. Azura had always felt it her prison.

 

“Yes?” She called back down, feeling it strange to heighten her voice for a reason besides singing.

 

“Come play with us!”

 

Then the Crown Prince cleared his throat and yelled up at her as well, “Train!”, as if to correct what Corrin had said, that what they were doing wasn’t something as silly as ‘play’.

 

She hid a laugh behind her hand, lest he see.

 

Azura would have refused if the Crown Prince hadn’t interjected. She was never allowed to approach the royal family. Here, she was unsure whether that was an *order or an invitation.

  
  
  


Later, with a sword in her hand and a blush on her face, she laughed.

 

\--

 

The King’s Advisor, Iago, was a man Azura had seen several times in her life.

 

Never so often as the years past since Corrin joined her at the Fortress.

 

“He’s nice,” Corrin said as they watched the castle gate open for him, “he’s super strong but he’s taking the time to come here and care for my sickness.”

 

Azura knew he was anything but nice. Especially in her own experiences, crossing his bad side when she lived in the main castle. But she wouldn’t hurt Corrin’s pure naivety. 

 

Corrin all but ran down to the gates to greet their visitor, ever full of energy despite the sickliness they were said to have. It was only ever after they were visited by Iago that they seemed ill. A side effect of whatever medicine it was that Iago gave them, it was said.

 

Azura knew Iago wasn’t a medicine man.

 

* _ ”I’m doing so much better since I’ve come here, with his help,” Corrin said once, when they had just gotten out of bed days after Iago’s visit, “before, I wasn’t even able to stand up.” _ __   
_   
_ __ “What was that like?” Azura asked, curious despite knowing it was probably rude.

 

_ “Oh, I don’t remember that far back...just being in bed and waking up from my fever.” _

  
  


Azura stayed put, not wanting to so much as step in his path. Gauntlets did more than just sting across cheeks. She could mostly invisible, a talent she’d come to learn in her years in Nohr. One that she was, with Corrin’s help, learning to be a skill and not a necessity.

 

A skill that she put to use when her wandering nearly took a turn into what fate had decided to be the wrong hall.

 

“The child is progressing well for your purposes,” she heard Iago’s nasal voice say to someone she did not see, for she dared not take another step in that direction. She used her dancer’s feet, light steps backwards, to back away from that corner until she could dash down a different hall.

 

Perhaps, fate had decided that was the right hall for her to walk that day.

 

Her mother had, after all, passed a duty onto her.

 

She had put off for too long what she had been piecing together about Corrin. That things weren’t what they seemed.

 

She needed to find out, even if just for Corrin’s sake.


	4. Leo, 16

As intelligent as he wanted to seem, the Hoshidan second prince resorted to dirty tactics when in competition. Especially when he was very clearly losing.

 

Leo felt he himself was able to keep his head clear as he decimated the board between himself and Takumi. Even if he had to quiet himself from retorts a few times, to convince himself that the satisfaction of a successful move would get more of a rile out of his opponent than his harsh words.

 

That didn’t stop Takumi’s shit-talking, though.

 

It had been going on throughout the game, until it seemed to come to a head.

 

“By Hoshidan bastardry law, you aren’t a prince,” Takumi said as Leo moved a stone and took up a liberty.

“If that’s the case, I’m surprised they even keep you in the castle,” was Leo’s response.

 

He hardly heard Niles’ laugh at the comment from the corner of the room before he heard the clatter of stones hitting the floor. There went the rest of the game, he supposed that meant he won.

 

But there was little time for revelry. Takumi lunged at him.

 

Hands wrapped around his throat and there was yelling, and he grasped at the hands on him, but everything was so unexpected he couldn’t receive his bearings--

 

Niles was there, then, shoving the Hoshidan prince off, getting in between them. Leo grabbed at his shoulders, a pathetic move to hide he would later realize.

Especially because Niles couldn’t fight back in this situation. Not against a prince of the country he was prisoner. Not even to defend Leo, who he was sworn to protect.

 

More cowardly was that Takumi realized this. Leo saw what was happening, fists beating at Niles’ chest, nails scratching at his face. But Niles didn’t seem to react, only holding him back.

 

It didn’t last long, at least.

 

The Crown Prince slid open the door to the room, definitely attracted by the ruckus Takumi was making with his yelling and the destruction of their game board. The man immediately walked in and grabbed his brother by the back of his collar and pulled him from the room, without a word to Leo or Niles.

 

Leo did hear a slap in the hallway, though.

 

With heavy breathing, Leo pulled away from Niles’ shoulders. He brought his fingers to his neck and touched the skin tentatively, uncertain of if it would hurt. The skin was hot to his touch and wet with sweat, but he was still numbed from adrenaline through his veins.

 

“Milord, are you alright?” Niles asked, turning to Leo. His face had scratches littering it, some with blood beginning to well up out of them. It was as if Takumi would have gouged his good eye out, too, if he had gotten far enough…

 

“Niles, you’re bleeding--”

 

His retainer shook his head, as if to ward off Leo’s concern. He then brought fingers up to Leo’s neck and touched them delicately to the skin, “You’ve got some bruising. I’ll do you a favor and tell everyone they’re hickies, if you so wish.”

 

“Oh? Who from?” Leo leaned into Niles’ touch, a comfort, a way to ground himself into the moment, to drown out the agitation his body and mind felt. 

 

“That’s where you give it an air of mystery and gain some more appeal,” Niles hummed, then wrapped his arms around Leo. As if he could sense that was what Leo wanted, true grounding. Leo didn’t even know he wanted it himself.

 

“Everyone in the castle probably heard that,” Leo muttered into Niles’ shoulder, “It’ll be no question where these bruises came from.”

 

“It seems you found a touchy subject,” Niles hummed, “because I know you listen to the servant gossip as much as I. You know that grain of truth hidden in there…”

 

Niles had caught him, but there was a legitimate reason for his eavesdropping. The servant gossip was the only way he could know anything of his situation, of the goings on outside of Shirasagi. He was a war prisoner, after all, despite how kind his prison was. The child he’d been taken in exchange for likely didn’t have it as nice in Nohr. Nohr was not a forgiving place.

 

“...Yes,” Leo replied, “The first Hoshidan bastard is the reason I was taken, after all. It’s not a far stretch that there would be a second.” Then he snorted, “Thanks for that, by the way.” 

 

Niles chuckled at that. He was stuck here, too, because of that. 

 

“We’ve been here longer than we lived in Nohr,” Leo then sighed, “but it doesn’t feel as if it’s home. It’s...liminal. Our stomachs are full and the conditions are kind, but…”

 

“Being Nohrian is in your bones,” Niles said with a smirk, “Hoshidans are soft with their pampered lives, they don’t know hardship. We’re weathered from before we’re born. Even you, with your silver spoon.”

 

“Even if anyone besides the Queen cared for us here, they wouldn’t understand,” Leo leaned his head against Niles’ chest and closed his eyes, “It’s only us.”

 

“...Yeah. Just us.”   
  
Leo felt himself nodding off, listening to the sound of Niles’ heart. He was warm and felt safe there, in his retainer’s arms…

 

“Milord.”

 

He made a sleepy noise of acknowledgement.

 

“I have to go wash my face of this blood, milord,” Niles said, then ran a hand through Leo’s hair as he started to pull away, “I’ll roll out your futon so that you may nap.”

 

… Leo didn’t want him to go. He wanted Niles to stay with him, to keep him to himself while he was in his sleepy state.

 

“...’kay,” Leo mumbled, “join me when you’re done.”

 

His mattress was cold until a weight fell beside him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> implications of takumi being a bastard in the JP version :U


	5. Leo, 16

 

“Aah, my poi broke again,” Leo sighed and stepped away from the goldfish scooping stall. He reached into his yukata for his coin purse, pulling it out to reveal scarcely a few silvers and coppers. “Oh,” he then chuckled a little, “guess I’m done for this festival, huh?”

 

“Here,” Niles laughed a little,too, “I’ll play a round for you.”

 

Leo wasn’t going to say that he wanted to win the fish himself, but… he did want a fish. He’d let Niles try, at least. Maybe if only to see Niles struggle, too.

 

Hovering close to Niles, he watched the exchange of coin, how Niles looked the poi over forward and back, and the way Niles carefully crouched beside the basin. While the fish fled from the bowl, Niles set it in so gentle that the water was hardly disturbed and they soon swam close once more.

 

Then, with one deft swoop… there was a fish in the bowl.

 

“Aah, there we go. One fish for milord,,” Niles breathed out and stood with the fish bowl and unbroken poi in hand, which he held out toward Leo,  “Would you have a go at it, too?” 

 

If Niles could catch a fish in one swipe, then Leo ought to be able to catch at least one. He didn’t need another goldfish, but he had a point to make. He had to show off a little. 

 

Leo took the poi and settled down onto his knees, leaning over the tub. He settled the bowl in just as gently as Niles had-- or, at least as close to that as he could. Immediately, all of the fish fled. What was he doing wrong here? 

 

He eyed the pond, looking for a fish that seemed to be not particularly in tune with its survival instincts. Upon finding that chosen fish… Leo dipped the poi into the water…

 

The fish rammed it, swimming into the paper and ripping the poi open.

 

Perhaps that fish was strong enough that it didn’t question its survival instincts. Tactical knowledge would likely have been of use here.   
  
Leo cursed and stood.

 

Niles stepped forward and poked at his lip, “Pouty, you got a fish.”

 

“I don’t get it. What did I do wrong?” his brow furrowed and he crossed his arms, tangling himself up a bit in the sleeves of his yukata.

 

“Mm, for starters, you were looming over them… I don’t suppose fish enjoy that. Here, don’t do any looming for him,” Niles said as he handed over the fishbowl, “Oh. Damn, I caught you the ugly one. Sorry.”

 

The fish mostly paddled in place, which gave Leo an opportunity to look it over, to see what Niles meant. It was a normal goldfish. Orange with black spots, silly ones in particular that were right over its eyes that gave it the look of having some very bushy eyebrows.

 

Eyes…eye. The fish was missing an eye. It wasn’t too noticeable, a black spot in that location as well.

 

“It seems some child must have gotten too excited for a goldfish,” Leo hummed, “but he’s a handsome fish. I like his eyebrows.”

 

Niles laughed.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> poor niles :( the ugly one


	6. addendum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A summary of how the story kind of would have gone

azura and corrin do some plotty things; finding that corrin is being manipulated via Iago's magic, finding that garon is indeed a fuckt up possessed corpse. they travel a few times thru valla to hoshido and make contact w leo and niles

 

they do stuff. collaborating, trying to plan how to end things. yeah.

 

azura ends up being the one to kill garon. she escapes to valla, corrin follows her, they realize they fell in love along the way. niles and leo also do. the end.

**Author's Note:**

> hiii everyone thank you for reading the first chapter of this  
> i guess i'll info dump a little bit right here. the early leo & niles parts are in part inspired by an rp with 5ampancakes.  
> here, niles was under shura's tutelage of the great arts of thievery WHICH IS WHY HE IS THERE...
> 
> and this fic will be operating more focused on leo & niles most likely ("why?") because i love azura too much to think about her for too long without getting really sad
> 
> this is my first time in (check calendar) since 2014 im trying a chapter fic so comments and encouragement are very appreciated ;u;


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